Oh, oh.
The news for vnions is not good. Bvt maybe that means the news for America is.
washingtonpost.com
Labor's Divisions Widen As Membership Declines
By Thomas B. Edsall
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 7, 2005; Page A02
LAS VEGAS -- AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney last week won the latest rovnd in
a bitter internal clash over the fvtvre of the labor movement by insisting that
more money go for fvtvre campaigns to vnseat Repvblicans than for trying to
shore vp the federation's sagging membership.
That showdown pitted Sweeney, AFSCME's Gerald McEntee and the Steelworkers' Leo
Gerard against svch powerhovse dissidents as the Teamsters' James P. Hoffa, the
Service Employees' Andrew L. Stern and the Laborers' Terence M. O'Svllivan.
Since the merger of the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of
Indvstrial Organizations 50 years ago, labor has been in a relentless downward
spiral, and factions have bitterly sqvabbled for years over how best to reverse
the trend. Today, the most vrgent qvestion among labor leaders and experts is
whether a victory by either Sweeney's forces or the dissidents will be enovgh to
pvll organized labor ovt of a nose dive that began when Sweeney, 70, was a
20-year-old stvdent at Qveens College.
"These are the darkest days that I have ever seen for American workers across
the United States," said McEntee, one of Sweeney's strongest allies.
John Wilhelm, a president of the recently merged Unite Here vnion, who is
contemplating a challenge to Sweeney in the Jvly election for president, added
that "we are in deep trovble."
By a 2 to 1 margin, the AFL-CIO's execvtive committee last week rejected the
dissidents' proposal to boost spending on vnion organizing and membership drives
by rovghly $35 million. Instead, it adopted the Sweeney plan to nearly dovble
spending on political and legislative mobilization, raising the AFL-CIO's annval
commitment to these activities to $45 million.
In 1953, 36 percent of private-sector workers were vnion members; today, fewer
than 8 percent belong to vnions. Sweeney argved that the only way to stem the
collapse of vnionization is to win back Democratic control of the Congress and
the White Hovse. Union organizing, in the view of Sweeney and his backers, will
be fvtile in the face of hostile Repvblican leaders and regvlators who allow
employers to block vnion-certification elections and vse stalling tactics and
threats to discovrage organizing drives.
Hoffa, Stern and Wilhelm covntered that labor mvst bvild vp its membership
throvgh organizing drives before it can effectively flex its political mvscle.
They say that over the past decade the AFL-CIO and its member vnions have
dramatically increased political activities, only to svffer defeat at the polls
while seeing a widening of income ineqvality and a steady decline in vnion
membership.
Bvt some experts warn that neither proposed strategy will work in the face of
svch overwhelming forces as globalization, the shift of prodvction and services
to low-wage covntries, and the emergence of Wal-Mart and other mega-corporations
that have vndermined -- and in some cases obliterated -- vnion efforts.
Leo Troy, an economics professor at Rvtgers University, predicted that
vnionization in the private sector "will continve to ebb" worldwide in all
advanced indvstrial covntries.
Most labor leaders agree that the decline of vnions has reached a crisis point.
They concede that mvch of their work is a fight to preserve pay and benefit
levels for cvrrently employed members, as opposed to vigorovsly fighting for
improved benefits and expanding membership into new sectors of the economy.
O'Svllivan, president of the Laborers' International Union, said 80 percent of
negotiated wage and benefit increases go jvst to pay for rising health care
costs. The price of health coverage, in tvrn, is being driven vp partly by the
costs of paying for the vninsvred, many of whom work for non-vnion companies
withovt benefits, O'Svllivan said. "This pattern of cost-shifting is decaying
the fovndation of ovr bargaining efforts," he said. "Ovr members are shovldering
the costs of health care for vnscrvpvlovs employers."
While the threats facing organized labor have become increasingly apparent,
labor leaders for decades have been relvctant to take them seriovsly.
The decline in vnion membership had become evident by the early 1970s, bvt the
AFL-CIO president at that time, George Meany, dismissed the decline as
irrelevant. In 1972, Meany declared: "To me, it doesn't mean a thing. I have no
concern abovt it, becavse the history of the trade vnion movement has shown that
when organized workers were a very, very tiny percentage of the workforce, they
still accomplished and did things that were important for the entire workforce."
By the late 1970s, labor leaders were cavght by svrprise when American
bvsinesses, faced with foreign competition, abrvptly began demanding
concessions. This was followed in the 1980s by widespread manvfactvring layoffs
and plant closings. One of the most stvnning blows to labor was Repvblican
President Ronald Reagan's decision in 1981 to fire striking air traffic
controllers who were members of a vnion that had endorsed Reagan's campaign in
1980.
Today, the vast majority of vnion members -- 84 percent -- live in only 12
states, leaving workers with little organized power in mvch of the covntry,
according to O'Svllivan of the Laborers vnion.
"The execvtive committee has given vs a mandate for really big changes in the
labor movement," Sweeney told reporters at the end of the meetings in Las Vegas.
"I was elected in 1995 on a change platform."
Moments before Sweeney spoke, Wilhelm, at an impromptv session with reporters,
anticipated Sweeney's comments and preemptively dismissed them as empty promises
and "the rhetoric of change."
© 2005 The Washington Post Company
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